


Never Stopped Looking

by FilipaMariaKecharitomene



Category: X-Men (Comicverse), X-Men - All Media Types
Genre: Big Brothers, F/M, Family Feels, For Gambit/Rogue Week 2021, Krakoa is a cult, Little Sisters, Siblings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-26
Updated: 2021-02-26
Packaged: 2021-03-17 01:20:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29709447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FilipaMariaKecharitomene/pseuds/FilipaMariaKecharitomene
Summary: In a world where Gambit and Rogue defect from Krakoa, they decide to take a vacation back to Paraiso with their three children after a year from hell. But the Lebeau's family-troubles don't go away, merely because their on vacation. For Gambit/Rogue Week 2021. Prompts: 'Irene/Olivier, Rebecca, and Irene being raised together' & 'Alternate Universe'
Relationships: Remy LeBeau/Rogue
Kudos: 4





	Never Stopped Looking

Hey Brother, there's an endless road to re-discover.  
Hey Sister, know the water's sweet but blood is thicker

If the sky comes falling down, for you...  
There's nothing in this world I wouldn't do...~Avicii

* * *

I

The sun was hot on the sandy shores of the Paraiso beach. All up and down the coast, folks were enjoying the day -swimming in the water, hunting shells, bouncing a volleyball around. Or just kicking back with a cool one. Which was what _he'd_ like to be doing, instead of this necessary interrogation. Remy Lebeau eyed the two small culprits seated on the beach towel with a practiced eye. It was astonishing how innocent-looking they be (which was how they _should_ look, at nine and seven years old) in their green and yellow polka-dot bathing suits. They were defiant little things, all huffy, crossed armed. With pouts that would one day be as devastating as their mama's.

But that didn't fool him none. For all they looked like cherubs, Rebecca and Irene were _his_ daughters. Rogue's too. Trouble was in their DNA, right alongside their so far inactivated X gene.

"Right den," he began, low and easily, crimson gaze flaring just enough to let them know this was serious charges brought against them. Sure enough, it brought on the first cracks in the girls' defiance -the bitings of their lips, the guilty shuffles. "Do y' wanna tell me why y' _files_ thought it be fine to torment yo' _fere'_ s girlfriend today?"

Torment may have been overstating it slightly...but honestly, not by much. Both Remy and Rogue had known that their girls hadn't been _happy_ to hear that fourteen-year-old Olivier had invited Annie May Parker, a mutate hailing from the Big Apple, on their vacation with them. ' _Anime_ ', Oli had nicknamed her, who took after her father, the legendary Wall-Crawler himself in terms of powers, and her _tres_ _belle_ mother in terms of her red hair, freckled skin, and happy green eyes.

The two kids had met last year; when they both found themselves kidnapped to flower-addicted Krakoa against their will, 'long with other mutant or mutate kids. And tossed without mercy in Apocalypse's new and improved Crucible, which meant to increase their powers by butchering and resurrecting them. Over and over till they finally arrived at their "perfect" form. (All while privileges were given to mutants born of two mutant parents like Oli...more food, better accommodations, nicer clothes...while kids with even one human parent like Annie were restricted to curfews and separate facilities..and humiliation. All animals are equal, _ai-je raison?_ Just some more equal than others.

Just thinking about that nightmare was enough to set Remy's teeth to creaking. More than thirty kids had gone into Crucible that year. By the time the Lebeaus and the Parkers had arrived to rescue their _infants_...Olivier and Annie had been the only ones left standing.

In their original bodies at least.

And there was no way to hold any on that island accountable...the quiet council denied all knowledge and all responsibility, instead offering 'reparations' for two traumatized, bruised, and bleeding children. (Rogue and the Wall-Crawler had told them in no uncertain terms where they could stick their 'reparations'. While Gambit had informed Xavier himself just how much information a Thief could steal, and pass on to SHIELD about Krakoa, if any of the plant-people so much as _breathed_ towards his children.)

Remy sighed and massaged his forehead under copper-brown strands -far more lined than it had been in his youth. The result of far too much living.

"She shouldn't have come 'long no how," Bekka said stubbornly, though her soft brown eyes couldn't meet her father's. "This was supposed to be a family vacation. _She_ ain't family."

"Ain't family," Irene echoed, diligently copying her big sister's posture.

"She's yo' brother's guest tho'," Remy said firmly. "That means y' don't go hiding her bathin' suit on 'er or put sand in 'er water bottle...or trade syrup fo' 'er sunblock. Y' didn't just cause her harm, y' hurt yo' _fere_ too."

Bekka's shoulder went slack at that, her lower lip starting to tremble. "Oli hasn't been the same since he met that gal. It's her fault. she changed 'im."

"Changed 'im," Iri agreed sadly.

Remy shut his eyes a moment. He, Rogue, and Olivier had decided together that it was best to keep the girls in the dark, 'bout what exactly had happened to their brother on Krakoa.

"Dey're too young t' know how bad the world can get," his then thirteen-year-old son had said, his own brown eyes deepening with his emotions to Remy's crimson on black. Already far too much innocence lost.

"No, girl. It not 'er. Wasn't 'er at all."

* * *

II

"Oli, sugah, baby, please..." Rogue tried to soothe her oldest child, a mite down the beach where his father was disciplining his sisters. But given that Olivier's little girlfriend was back at the cabana with a nasty sunburn, her boy wasn't in the mood to be soothed. (And good _Lord_ , it was hard to believe her baby was on the dating market...though really it shouldn't be. He was getting to be a looker, just like his Daddy.)

"No Mom," he snapped, with a show of her temper, the black and red trucks of his bathing suit slapping against his legs in the surf, while he reached down, grabbed some ocean stones, before charging them with his share of Gambit's power and releasing 'em to explode over the water.

" _Dieu_ ," he hissed, face scrunched up something awful. "I jus' wanted a good time. A good day. Jus' _one-good-day_ after last year. The hell Bekka an' Iri have to go an' ruin it for?!"

"Ya been pullin' 'way from 'em Oli," Rogue softly reminded him, reaching out to trail her hand down his cheek -and even now, couldn't help but marvel at the simple brilliance at being able to do so. It was still soft, though recently, Remy had begun to teach him how to shave.

She didn't like to think she had a favorite out of her children, but...God have mercy on her... Oli had been her miracle, her first baby, the one who had ended her curse and made her a Mama. He'd opened her womb by being conceived as a mutant, absorbing and ridding her skin of their powers, gained and ingrained, forever an' always (a price she accepted and happily paid,though it was why Krakoa had wanted him under their control so bad...). He was the one who made the way straight for his siblings to come after 'im, her darling girls. But the girls were their father's. Rogue was closest to Olivier, and him to her.

"Ya went from bein' their best big brother t' a stranger," she finished, low and gentle.

Olivier stiffened and turned his face away. "Do y' _blame_ me? I don't want 'em anywhere near de stuff inside me now...if dey got a good look, dey wouldn't want to be near it either."

Rogue's heart broke all over again for him, for the things he'd seen that no baby should be forced to see. They should've rescued him soon. Hell, Remy and she never should've gotten involved with Krakoa in the _first_ place. That was numbero one thousand in the list of mistakes they'd made in their lives...but it was one that had reached out its hand to molest her child.

By some of the very people, she'd once called her friends. She reached out again, this time deliberately touching the angry lash scars between his shoulders blades that Oli refused to talk about, regarding who given 'em to him -Rogue remember the night they brought him back home and seen 'em for the first time, Gambit and her: Remy had to get up and leave the room for a moment, while Rogue had bitten clean through her lip trying not to _howl._

"That ain't true, Baby..."

But Oli only sighed the way his father would and began to stroll back up the beach. "I'm gonna go check on Annie. See ya later, Mom."

* * *

III

The sun setting over the ocean always cast the illusion of peace over the world, Rogue had found, hugging herself in a white negligee as she stood on the cabana deck, musing on all things gone wrong in the last year.

Strong, familiar arms, tanned and roughened by the sun closed 'round her waist, tugging her close, tugging her home.

"Whatcha thinkin' chere?" Remy murmured into the skin of her neck. She sighed and burrowed deeper into him, all that sun-warmed skin of his chest, wondering if this was how sailors would feel if tossed from their ships, they had finally managed to crawl onto a shore, leaving the abyss behind.

"Everything, sugah," she reported glumly. "How are the girls?"

Remy heaved a sigh -he always hated punishing their children. "Set 'em to their room...think they 'bout cried 'emselfs to sleep by now."

Shifting in his grasp without breaking their touch, Rogue stroked her hand over his cheek, dying light glinting off her marriage ring. "Don't beat ya self up over it, Swamp Rat. They earned a nice tahme out fair an' square."

He hummed indiscriminately at that before his gaze grew serious.

"And hows our _fils_?"

Rogue bit her lip, and before she knew it, she was burying her head in Remy's shoulder.

"He's lost," she whispered. "Lost as bad as either o' us ever was, Remy..."

 _"Non,_ " her husband denied, his eyes glowing so very fierce. "When we were lost, we were alone. Dat's de one thing none o' our children _ever_ gon' be."

"Even without the X-men?" she muttered. While she couldn't regret leaving the team, given the path they chose, it still hurt. People grew on your heart so, that having to cut them off was like tearing part of yourself away.

Remy's voice was cold when he answered.

"Given dat none o' them lifted a finger t' help Olivier when he was imprisoned on dat hellhole, dey lost all claim t' callin us family."

She knew that...and God, hearing it from Oli's lips had been like taking a train to the gut. Kurt had housed him. Logan had trained him to fight in the Crucible. Storm had tried to indoctrinate him the old fashion way...and Jean and Xavier had tried to slip into his mind.

But Kitty... _Kitty._..

Olivier wouldn't say what Kitty -or _Kate_ \- had tried to do to convince him to drink the Krakoan kool-aid, though his neck had gone red and he wouldn't meet their eyes. Given her already shady history of luring Franklin Richards, this had bumped Shadowcat a few notches higher on Rogue's Maim-On-Sight list.

People who could do those things to a child -any child- could never be her friends. Nevermind her teammates.

"Sometimes Ah wish we never met 'em," she confessed lowly. "That way, we couldn't miss 'em."

Remy hummed, considered. "Mais if we'd never met dem, I might not'a met y' _chere._ "

"Don't believe that," she bit out fiercely, shaking her head. "If any world has you an' Ah in it, sooner or later we'd of found each other. Y'all've found meh, Remy Lebeau."

" _Oui,_ " he said, eyes warming into certainty. "Would never o' stopped lookin'."

They were silent a long moment, at peace if they ever were.

_Finis_

* * *

**Author's Note:**

> Read and review. Anyone artistic on deviant art, please feel free to draw!
> 
> In the Gennext comics Olivier dated Megan Summers...but she's his genetic cousin so...ew...instead I paired him with Spider-Man's daughter from the miniseries Renew Your Vows, Annie May Parker(com'on Marvel, make it happen, its cute!). Which I highly recommend. And in case you haven't noticed...I don't like the Krakoa-cult thing.
> 
> Think this could be a full story?


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